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After the Tsunami, at the 'Women’s River'

January 23, 2014 /

Minna no Ie
('Home-for-All') where refugees can gather. Photo by Ulf
Meyer

The towns in Japan's
Tōhoku region were practically wiped off the face of the earth by
the tsunami on March 9, 2011. What little remains is hastily being
replaced by new settlements built on elevated plateaus. No
memorials are wanted. But former residents - and architect
initiatives such as Architecture for Humanity - disagree with the
hasty reconstruction plans made up by the central
government.

By Ulf Meyer

The sign with the name of the town of Onagawa
is still standing. But the place itself is not. "Are we there yet?"
I ask Miku Kani, who works for Architecture for Humanity in Japan.
"Hai" ("Yes"), she says - and that is devastating because there is
nothing here, only puddles and rubble The town of Onagawa was a
port town with 12,000 inhabitants located in Miyagi Prefecture, the
central part of Tōhoku, facing the Pacific Ocean, northeast from
Tōhoku's largest city, Sendai. When we arrive after a two-hour
drive in our little van, it is painfully obvious: The earthquake
and tsunami two years ago not only destroyed the town; the town has
simply ceased to be.

Even the last traces of its existence are now
becoming blurred with great technical and financial effort.
Abashedly we are standing around on some random tiles on what must
have once been the floor in one of the houses that were flushed out
by the tidal wave that swept up to one kilometer into the
hinterland, completely crushing the town and pulling it back into
the open sea.

"Ona-gawa" means "women's river" in Japanese.
But neither women nor a river can be seen here - only excavators,
portable toilets, construction containers with wood
veneer-imitation, and some vending machines stand around in the
dirt where the local shopping street once was. Japanese
construction companies have received large contracts for the
reconstruction and have come here to make everything shiny and
new.

Onagawa shares its fate with many other towns
along the Japanese Pacific coast. The tsunami caused heavy damage
to more than 270 miles of shoreline. Within just a few minutes,
about 200,000 houses were destroyed and 20,000 lives were
lost.

Kitami 'We
Are One' market. Photo by Ulf
Meyer

Residents want no recollection of the event

The neighboring town of Minami Sanriku once
had 20,000 inhabitants. More than half of them are dead or missing.
In the now devastated former downtown area, only the lonely ruin of
the former disaster prevention center is still around. Today the
three-story "Bosai Taisaku Chosha" is a gutted rusty red steel
skeleton. Thirty helpless people had tried to take refuge on the
roof of the building when the tsunami hit. Mayor Jin Sato was one
of them. He had just attended a disaster prevention meeting when
the tsunami hit. Soon the waters rose even higher and washed over
the roof. Right here the tidal wave reached up to 52 feet in
height. Of 130 official city employees, Sato was one of only ten
survivors.

The remaining steel frame of the building -
now adorned with flowers, incense, and a Buddha statue - was
redefined as a makeshift shrine. Soon it will be torn down. Then
nothing will be left of Minami Sanriku. The former residents say
that they want no recollection of the event". Thus, the repetition
of the tragedy in the future is already prescribed.

House in
Maeami. Photo by Ulf Meyer

The
proximity of the towns and the sea will soon be a thing of the
past, when the town get rebuild on a higher level/plateau. Photo by
Ulf Meyer

The resurrection

Japan will host the Olympics Games in the
summer of 2020 and thus will have the opportunity to show the world
a different image of itself - and divert attention from the misery
in the Northeast. In seven years, the balance will be drawn. How
did Japan deal with the aftermath of the triple blow of earthquake,
tsunami, and radiation leaks? To host the Games certainly is a
great honor - but therein also lies a danger:

"The money will now be spent on the Games",
says Miku-san. "That is simply much more attractive to
politicians". She complains bitterly about the average Japanese
citizen's lack of solidarity with people in the devastated and
contaminated northeastern part of the country. The attention
caravan has long moved on. Reeds grow on the bald spots where
houses once stood - in Onagawa and Minami Sanriku, as well as
throughout Tōhoku.

Last
remaining building in the neighbouring town of Onagawa. Photo
by Ulf Meyer

Proper urban development concepts needed

The central government in Tokyo is
desperately trying to make sure they look like they are acting
determinedly to not let the Tōhoku region plunge into an economic
tailspin without a fight by pledging billions of yens and sending
squadrons of cranes to the area. But to turn the current tabula
rasa into blossoming landscapes, everybody would have to return to
their homeland. Even before the disaster, the Tōhoku region - like
many other rural areas of Japan - suffered from a rapidly aging
population and shrinking cities.

Miku Kani of Architecture for Humanity
believes that instead of quick Yens and even quicker cranes, "the
area needs proper urban development concepts for the reconstruction
of the region. 'Consultants' design the new towns following the
model of American suburbs of the '50s". This activism brings a new
wave of destruction over the beleaguered towns. Architects and
planners are hardly involved in the reconstruction of Japan's
coastline.

Bosai
Taisaku Chosha (public emergency training center) in the town of
Minami-Sanriku. Photo by Ulf
Meyer

The means of escape need improvement

Hidden behind high seawalls and turned away
from the sea, Onagawa will be constructed 23 feet higher. To create
this new plateau, the surrounding forested mountains are capped and
soil and rock transported to fill the sink. Safety against
earthquake cannot be achieved; even reinforced dikes and sea walls
will not withstand a wave as powerful as that of March 2011. This
is why the means of escape need to be improved. And how long will
the new safeguarding against the sea withstand the urge of the
fishing industry to have access to the sea?

Onagawa and its neighboring cities have been
leveled, in the truest sense of the word - first by the waves, and
now by the excavators. The new settlements get stamped up on the
high plateaus, but they do not reach a higher level. The palimpsest
is overwritten - the next tsunami is sure to come.